Swiss launch corruption probe at UN weather body

ZURICH, May 6 (Reuters) A Swiss magistrate has launched a formal investigation into allegations of fraud four years ago in leadership elections at the World Meteorological Organisation, a spokeswoman for the UN agency said today.

Spokeswoman Carine Richard-Van Maele was confirming a report in the NZZ am Sonntag newspaper that Geneva public prosecutor Daniel Zappelli was investigating alleged attempts to use embezzled UN funds for influence peddling in a 2003 vote for the post of secretary-general.

''At the request of the Swiss authorities, the (WMO) secretariat has provided them with detailed information relating to election procedures in WMO and to the elections in 2003,'' she told Reuters.

The probe comes as the 188 member states of the WMO gather in Geneva for a four-yearly congress at which Secretary-General Michel Jarraud of France is standing for a second term.

Jarraud has denied any wrongdoing.

Zappelli was not immediately available to comment on the investigation which is linked to an earlier Swiss probe into allegations of embezzlement, which first came to light in 2003.

''I opened an investigation on Friday based on the suspicion of bribery by foreign officials,'' Zappelli was quoted as saying in the newspaper.

The probe into the WMO, whose aims include safeguarding the environment and water resources, adds to a series of probes hanging over various United Nations bodies. New UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has pledged to root out corruption.

NZZ said that according to prosecution documents there was a ''reasonable suspicion that in the runup to the election of a new WMO general secretary, there was an attempt to favour the election of a specific candidate.'' It cited a leaked internal agency memo as saying that WMO officials allegedly offered to pay travel costs and provide an allowance to some of the delegates from developing countries in return for their pledge to vote for a certain candidate.

It did not say who the candidate was, but initially Kenya's Evans Mukolwe stood against then French official candidate Jean Pierre Beysson. Jarraud subsequently emerged when neither of the two won sufficient votes.

Jarraud took over from long-serving WMO secretary-general Godwin Obasi of Nigeria.

Obasi had earlier suspended without pay and then dismissed a Sudanese employee in charge of funds involved in the embezzlement probe.

The WMO filed a criminal complaint with Swiss judicial authorities the same year and lifted diplomatic immunity from those implicated and implemented new internal controls.

In January, the WMO said it had recovered some 300,000 dollars of the 3.4 million dollars believed to have been embezzled.

REUTERS SM RK2100